Political Science 1020E Lecture 8: Democracy 1
8 Dec 2016
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Document Summary
Political power: the power to issue and enforce binding commands. Everyone, political power should be distributed equally, every citizen should have an equal say. Government of, for, and by the people. Indirect: voters choose representatives who then make decisions. More direct is more democratic but not necessarily better. Extreme lack of accountability: representatives elected for life. Watch for the impact of economic inequality on citizen"s opportunity to. Democracy aims for equal capacity of citizens to process information relevant to decision-making. participate in politics. Two ways to limit the scope of democracy: 1) by appeal to the democratic ideal, 2) by assigning the issue to the private sphere. The any are selfish, ignorant, and unpredictable. Intrinsic reasons: freedom as autonomy autonomy: giving lows to oneself. Democracy embodies a commitment to freedom or self rule. Rousseau on self rule: freedom is not the capacity to do what we want. Instead, freedom is obedience to laws we give ourselves.
